Note the
text in bold in the extract below.
ASX release 28 March 2018:"High scandium backgrounds are present at the three Wellington East proposed pits, with values consistently >60ppmSc.
The scandium background would appear to exceed that of the Goongarrie Hub, but this will be subject to resourceestimation which is just commencing for Kalpini.
If the future Goongarrie Hub HPAL plant includes a scandium circuit, then Kalpini high-scandium as a satellite feedis a definite option.
Currently, scandium is not included in the Goongarrie Hub financial model. With the current ALS bench-scalemetallurgy and Kalpini pulp re-assay results, the potential scandium by-product revenue contribution will be subjectto review."
ASX release 31 Oct 2017:The zones with elevated scandium concentration at Black Range are situated spatially above and withinthe uppermost parts of the cobalt and nickel resource. As such, scandium-bearing material willbe mined during the mining of the cobalt and nickel mineralisation.
Presently, the scandium resource is limited to the infill RC drill holes drilled by Ardea as a part of a programof cobalt and nickel resource definition in April this year. Drilling wasconducted over a strike length of around 1,200 metres. The drilling has revealed an initial scandiumresource area which is expected will be expanded through collection of further data.
The identified scandium mineralised zone is contained within the footprint of the 19.2 Mt of 0.09 % cobaltand 0.68 % nickel resource at Black Range. An inferred resource has been estimated at
8.70 Mt at 65.6 g/tscandium using a 50 g/t scandium lower cut-off. (approximate total contained scandium metal content of
570,000 kg).
With this new resource comprising only a small fraction of the strike length of the Black Range deposit, it is seen as the first step to achieving the previously stated
Exploration Target of 10–20 Mt at50–80 g/t scandium.
ARL website - About Critical Metals:The scandium market in 2023 was approximately 80 tonnes with supply at around 70 tonnes in demand largely meeting supply.
However, even minor increases in annual global aluminum production (which Scandium is alloyed with) would result in an annual global scandium demand of 345 tonnes, which is 11x the 2022 demand.
As the predicted for Scandium increases in Aerospace, Automotive, Defence, SOFC, and Wind Turbine industries, Scandium demand could reach almost
500 tonnes by 2030, which is 16x the 2022 demand.
Notes to self:- The JC, especially SMM, probably raised the optionality of ARL increasing the nameplate from 3.5MTpa to 4.0MTpa.
- Initially I had thought that it was for producing more Ni/Co. On further thought, that would be only 14% more tonnage resulting in 4,200T more Ni and 280T more Co. Every ton adds up, of course, but there's also the urgency of meeting the fast increasing global Sc demand, which adds an even more compelling factor to the optionality by including a scandium circuit.
- Kalpini's high scandium resource to serve as a satellite feed to GHR. The grades of 60ppm = 60g/T.
- Black Range tenements seem to have a matching supply of Sc resource and at similar grades, too.
- MC doesn't process SC, but SMM does by recovering scandium oxide (not pure Sc) at > 99.9% purity from Ni processing. (Per SMM website)
- Any near-future infill drilling activities at the relevant Kalpini and Black Range tenements would be highly indicative. Looking forward to news on this front. Hint, hint...
(20min delay)